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GWSR Broadway Developments

Discussion in 'Heritage Railways & Centres in the UK' started by Breva, Aug 1, 2014.

  1. Breva

    Breva Well-Known Member

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    We could have had Ashburton... that was previous project management though.

    Give the new chairman a chance, he has done well so far. I am encouraged.
     
  2. huochemi

    huochemi Part of the furniture

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    A bit rich for someone who writes "died in the wool" to criticise other people's spelling.:rolleyes:
     
  3. davidarnold

    davidarnold Member

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    Oh! A palpable hit sir!
     
  4. davidarnold

    davidarnold Member

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    Breva, as our man on the ground and Heritage Committee chairman I defer to you. In truth my email exchanges with your new Chairman were polite and he did consult.

    So let us draw a line under previous project management.

    So, under new Management how could the design and commissioning of the new Visitor Centre have been handled.

    First the Heritage Committee could have been consulted and not brushed aside.
    Second the membership could have been canvassed for their views.
    Third an appeal could have been launched to raise funds to construct an Ashburton facsimile suited to the Visitor Centre needs.
    Fourth other areas of funding could have been explored i.e. Lottery funds with a commitment that the new building would interpret the past.

    The end result would I suggest have resulted in an Ashburton facsimile that closely matched the existing station in its style and would have educated future generations as to its previous function.

    Such an approach worked for the MHR and Arlesford Goods shed.
     
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  5. Bean-counter

    Bean-counter Part of the furniture

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    I highlight an important point - there can be a reluctance to try Appeals - 'they'll get sick of us asking' and I suspect a fear that a Charitable Appeal for funds for the visitor centre might detract from the Share Issue for Broadway. There seems to be a widely held belief that there is a fixed pot of funding a Railway will get by asking, but that it doesn't matter what it is appealing to fund! I don't believe this is the case and would suspect a few regular posters here would respond to an appeal for funds for creating buildings of authentic appearance but might be dubious about buying more shares, or maybe for whom funding a loco or a carriage would leave them cold. Too many on heritage railways fail to realise this - by all means have a main fund raising effort but don't stop all other fund raising, just be sensible about a range of different things that will 'appeal' to different peoples' pockets!

    Steven

    (Another common attitude is 'oh, let's get on with it - we can't wait for making grant applications to make the money we have go further/buy more', which could also be said of an appeal).
     
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  6. Kinghambranch

    Kinghambranch Well-Known Member

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    Your second picture shows the new Winchcombe building before all work, including landscaping and some detailing been completed. So it isn't an absolutely true state of the current, and future, situation. Anyway, never mind, it's what we've got and it will see good use as a Santa HQ and an exhibition, meeting and education centre. It does still look very much like an erstwhile goods shed to me! I'm content with it given Winchcombe Station yard could have so easily been a housing estate, and very nearly was.
     
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  7. davidarnold

    davidarnold Member

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    Kinghambranch, face it, with the greatest respect, no detailing can save this building it has no railway DNA at all.

    It would just be putting lipstick on a pig.

    I'm just going to have to close my eyes as I pass it on my way to

    BROADWAY!

    Where the PW guys have just crossed the bridge. How amazing is that! Well done to them. Heroes all!

    Broadway Bridge crossed.jpg
     
    Last edited: Nov 25, 2017
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  8. ruddingtonrsh56

    ruddingtonrsh56 Member

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    Can I just encourage people to stop being so negative? What's done is done. Rather than grumble constantly about what you don't like, celebrate what you do. Like, for example, the fact that the P-Way team have reached Broadway. Which is a fantastic achievement in itself, even greater so when you consider the GWSR didn't take over their line until the 1980s when much of the infrastructure was lost, and they have been hit by crippling landslides in recent years. And if you want things to be done differently, join the railway. Volunteer. Get yourself in a position so that you can voice your opinion to those with decision making powers, and try to do it in a way that doesn't belittle but encourages. I know as a volunteer and interacting with the operations manager at the railway I'm based at how thankless a task it can be to have to make hard decisions. Cut them a little slack and give them a pat on the back for doing what they're doing, we wouldn't have functioning railways without them.
     
  9. Tuska

    Tuska New Member

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    Seconded. I've asked the same of some individuals here, only to be met with more negativity. They had one request, and they couldn't even manage that.

    I think some people here have never worked a day in their life.
     
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  10. Matt78

    Matt78 Well-Known Member

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    The GWSR is rapidly developing into a stunning railway. I really don’t understand what some people are complaining about. Yes it would be great to have everything looking heritage but it just isn’t possible. The building at Winchcombe could perhaps have been done in a better style but was there a C and W depot at the station in GWR days? Of course not and that’s the compromise you make when a heritage railway has to be run.

    Thanks to the blogs the efforts of the volunteers are rightly highted but for me there is no question that the management also deserve some of the plaudits for what is likely to be much unseen work in getting the job done. They are heroes just as much as the guys on the ground, and that won’t change no matter how much some protest.

    Regards

    Matt
     
  11. davidarnold

    davidarnold Member

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    I see a number of Newbies are turning up to this thread late in the day and unacquainted with the battles of the past have complained about what they see as negativity. So again I would ask them to please acquaint themselves with the full story before posting.

    First they need to understand that the GWSR as a whole and its hard working volunteers are not being criticized . Only certain aspects of the new builds at Broadway and Winchcombe, which are mostly the resp0onsibility of past project Management, recently retired.

    Ask yourselves before you start jumping on the negativity bandwagon, would you like to see plastic windows in the signal box at Broadway, a canopy made of B and Q parts instead of the magnificent structure fashioned by the Loco Department. Would you prefer non GWR chimneys on the building or the elegant ones that grace it now. Would you prefer a Gift shop to a Cafe there.

    Every single one of these things would have resulted at Broadway, which we wouldn't now be celebrating as we are, if people here on Nat Pres hadn't protested, and alerted shareholders and stakeholders as to what was proposed. The resulting feedback caused each of these decisions to be reversed. In some cases as the result of money put forward by myself and others whom you now accuse of negativity.

    To those who say why don't you volunteer and influence things, I say that each of the above items was sprung as a last minute decision by the then project management. The volunteers were the last to know. They weren't consulted , had no influence.

    So I would like to take this opportunity to thank everyone on Nat Pres and on the various blogs who made their voices heard, and got these decisions reversed.

    You guys weren't being negative, you were being constructive and supporting the hard working volunteers at Broadway. I applaud you.
     
    Last edited: Nov 26, 2017
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  12. Jamessquared

    Jamessquared Nat Pres stalwart

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    Just worth pointing out that a couple of the people you seem to think of as "newbies" have dates they joined NatPres as 2011 and 2009 respectively. The fact that people may have no or scarce posting history does not necessarily mean they haven't been following the ins and outs of the story for a considerable time.

    Tom
     
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  13. Sheff

    Sheff Resident of Nat Pres

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    The fact is that Broadway is a triumph and will remain so as a testament to those who fought for it and built it. The past is in the past, so let's celebrate and move on, instead of kicking a dead cat around?
     
  14. Kinghambranch

    Kinghambranch Well-Known Member

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    I'm not too sure about the accuracy of everything in your post above, but as I too, am not an active volunteer at the "coal face" or in the GWSR Boardroom, I can only go on what I've heard and not all of that has been on this Nat Pres Website for sure.

    I look forward to seeing you on the Broadway reopening train but I promise I won't speak to you as long as you don't speak to me, otherwise it could be like a scene out of the "Airplane" movie!;)
     
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  15. Kinghambranch

    Kinghambranch Well-Known Member

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    God be praised, a post from the real world!
     
  16. Tuska

    Tuska New Member

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    While I like your well-thought-out post, I do have to disagree on this small point.

    A lot of threads, including this one, are getting plagued with "naysayers" and "doom harbingers", who can only see and comment upon everything that can potentially go wrong. That's not being constructive. Being constructive is listing potential obstacles, and then discussing as a community how best we can tackle them together. Not, "awww but that'll cost money", or, "who'd want to see that?".

    I used to browse the threads, not paying much attention to this defeatist culture growing, and it wasn't until the Trawsfynydd and Blaenau Ffestiniog Railway thread, did I wake up, and decide to start directly participating again. Some of the responses were horrible, telling them their planning and work was all pointless. They were bringing their own personal bias to the discussion, not news, not developments, not solutions. I've decided its in everyone's best interest to not encourage them, but just hit the good old "ignore" button.

    Though they have themselves to blame for getting people like me involved, ironically.
     
  17. Mark Thompson

    Mark Thompson Well-Known Member

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    On a more positive note from all this stuff, I just love this study from yesterdays blog: Its a symphony of industry, natural beauty and dramatic lighting. Given its Worcestershire setting, the only thing missing is a bit of Elgar- perhaps the "great sunset" closing bars from his 2nd symphony?

    [​IMG]
     
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  18. Sidmouth4me

    Sidmouth4me Member

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    Totally agree. One would think that it is totally thanks to Nat Pres that Broadway is now having a cafe. I don’t think so. It is purely down to the volunteers and shareholders of the GWSR to reverse the decision in a grown up way. I also do hope it was none of us on here who wrote offensive emails as reported by the GSWR Board (Whilst we all welcome honest debate, some of the emails which have been sent to us have been objectionable; some have been unacceptably abusive) as they could so easily have had the opposite effect.
     
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  19. davidarnold

    davidarnold Member

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    Would that be the scene where you inflate yourself and fly off into the distance?
     
  20. Big Al

    Big Al Nat Pres stalwart Staff Member Moderator

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    There seems to be a little bit of 'people having the last word/moan' on here at present. It probably would help the cause if everyone moved on as the pway gang in #1737 seems to be.
     
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